Most electrical connectors are equipped with a single additional lock slider, which is inserted into the connector housing by the narrow side and thereby grips or locks the corresponding edges or similar elements of all the electrical contacts located in the contact chambers. Such a lock is not possible when, inside the connector housing, the contact chambers are positioned on a vertical axis at an angle to each other. In addition, this locking method is not possible with waterproofed electrical external connectors whose housing is to penetrate an opening in a wall in such a manner as to be watertight, if the narrow sides of the connector housing are covered with a seal and the lock slider cannot be repositioned.
With the previously known connector housings, the lock slider can only be inserted once all of the contact elements have been installed into the contact chambers. In the meantime, care must be taken that the contact elements do not slip out of the chambers or slide askew inside the chambers during assembly, which complicates the installation of the connector. The lock slider also makes it impossible to insert the contact elements into the chambers when the lock slider is actuated, which makes installation of the connector difficult.
Certain connector housings with internal primary locking through the metal tongues of a contact require that the necessary cutout in the housing be implemented from beneath, i.e. from the so-called connector profile, using the slider cores. This creates a second, laterally displaced opening for the slider core, positioned next to and extending into the connector opening. In solutions that up until now have not been waterproof, an outer housing with the desired connector profile was used in order to avoid accidental connections between the contact pins to be inserted into the connector housing and the contact elements located within the connector housing. The slider core opening is thereby covered up by the bottom plate of the outer housing. This effect, as well as the additional external lock, are attained through the use of a bottom plate equipped with detent grips.
The possibility of installing contacts into the chambers after assembly of the additional lock, which does not confine itself solely to the waterproofed embodiments, does not apply to these known connector versions.
Aside from bar-shaped lock sliders, comb-like lock sliders are known, which, however, possess the same disadvantages as the bar-shaped lock sliders.